Tag Archive: religious rites

I-je-re-ja, ka-ra-wi-po-ro and others, article by Cécile Boëlle, academia.edu:Click here to read this fascinating study on the role of women as priestesses in Mycenaean Religion.This article is in French. You can download it from the link above and open it in WORD or Open Office.

Academia.edu THESIS The Minoan and Mycenaean Agricultural Trade and Trade Routes in the Mycenaean Empire by Rita Roberts:Click on this logo to download her thesis:
We are proud to announce that Rita Roberts has fulfilled the requirements of her second year of university, and has passed with a mark of 85 %. We have awarded her 90 % for thesis, The Minoan and Mycenaean Agricultural Trade and Trade Routes in the Mycenaean Empire, which is a finely researched document I highly recommend to any and all. It deals in great detail with every conceivable aspect of Minoan and Mycenaean agricultural trade via their trade routes in the Mycenaean Empire, ca. 1600-1450 BCE. We congratulate Rita on her splendid achievement, and we look forward to her fuflling the exacting requirements of her third and final year of university which commences on July 1 2018, Canada Day. Once she has completed her third year, she will have earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in Minoan and Mycenaean studies.

Rita Roberts’ translation of Knossos tablet KN J 1 f 01, her last tablet for her second year of university:

Line 1: Deukijojo = month name + temeno = shrine. The damaged first syllabogram looks like TO. The actual word temeno = “temple” does not appear on the first line of this tablet, since it appears that the the scribe has made a scribal error, which actually happens quite often on Linear B tablets. The writing is messy, and appears to read teno, which would explain the scribal error, i.e. he missed on one syllabogram. Deukijojo could either be a month name, in which case it means “the tenth month” or more properly in this content, “of the tenth month” or it could simply be a person’s name. If it refers to the tenth month, then it follows that the entire tablet refers to this month.

Padarejode = a place hame, which is a sanctuary = hence, olive oil from Dardare and 2 units (probably bales) of barley.

Line 4:

Pade = name plus olive oil and 1 unit (probably a bale) of barley

Line 5:

Pasiteoi = “to all gods” barley and 1 unit of olive oil

Line 6:

olive oil and barley for Qerasiya = goddess Artemis, with numerals absent because of right truncation.

Line 7:

1 unit of barley to all the gods at Aminiso = Amnisos

Line 8:

2 units (probably pithoi) of olive oil for the goddess Erinu. Note that Erinu references one of the Furies (Erynies) in Greek. So it would appear that the scribe tells us that there was a sacrifice to at least one of or probably all of the Furies to appease them so that crops would thrive.

Line 9:

Gold and olive oil and 1 cyperus plant, probably dedicated to the priestess of the winds in Line 10.

Line 10:

4 cyperus plans dedicated to Anemo Ijereja = to the priestess of the winds

This is the very last tablet Rita Roberts is to translate for her second year of university, and it is by far the most challenging she has ever been confronted with to date. Congratulations to Rita! She is now about to take her final examination for her second year, which is to consist of 25 questions in increasing level of difficulty, the last 5 of which are to be translations of tablets, plus her second year thesis paper, What did the Minoan agricultural sector contribute to the Mycenaean Empire? This paper must be at least 25 pages long, inclusive of the bibliography but excluding illustrations, which will add to the page length of her thesis. Since this thesis paper is much more difficult than her first year thesis, I am allotting her three months to complete it, i.e. Feb. 15 – May 15. However, she must complete the rest of the examination in just 2 weeks (Feb. 15 – March 1 2018).

In the next post, I shall re-inscribe the entire tablet in archaic Greek from the Mycenaean.

The decipherment of this tablet is far from clear-cut, and all because of 1 word, paro, the first on both lines 1 and 2. This word very likely corresponds to the ancient Greek pa/loj (palos) = a lot (cast), meaning a lot cast by one or more people to decide who is obliged to do something, and in this case, which is apparently a religious context, that something is the sacrifice of a billy goat and a she goat. Etowono got the lot for the ram, probably the long stick, if that is what it was, given that we are dealing with a ram here. Komawete got the short one for the she goat. It kind of makes sense, and in fact there would seem to be no other rational interpretation of this tablet. It is one of the trickiest I have ever assigned to Rita, and this aroused her suspicions in the first place. Because she could not possibly have recognized the (archaic or ancient) Greek for paro, I had to delve into that word. Otherwise, her translation is highly commendable, and deserves a full 100 %.

A few months ago, I tentatively deciphered Linear A tablet New interpretation of Linear A tablet HT 7 (Haghia Triada), but when I look back on that decipherment now, I find it implausible. So I have re-interpreted here in light of new data I have acquired since then. As the tablet is inscribed mostly in Old Minoan, it is rather difficult to make complete sense of it. However, the two Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1) terms offer us a clue. These are iruja = “a priestess” and tanati, which appears to be dative singular for “death”. However, although iruja is nominative singular, it is followed by the number 3, which would seem to indicate that there are 3 priestesses. And the Minoan plural of a is e, hence iruje. The only explanation I can find for this discrepancy is that the 3 priestesses are operating independently, one by one, each one making at least 1 offering, while 1 priestess makes 2, for a total of 4. But this translation, which is rather convoluted, remains in doubt because I cannot verify with any real certainty the meanings of the Old Minoan words. However, it does manage to hold together. Perhaps someday in the future, we shall unearth more Linear A tablets, which will provide us with insight into the significance of the Old Minoan vocabulary.

This silver pin, PL Zf 1, from Mavro Spelio, now housed in the A.Y. Nikolaos Museum, Crete, bears an inscription which may read dextrograde (left-to-right) or sinistrograde (right-to-left), but either way the text reads the same way. The inscription is a mixture of Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1) and Old Minoan. The words Tanunikina (nom. fem. sing.) and Ninuni (dat. sing.) are almost certainly eponyms, with the former acting in some way as an agent of healing to the latter. Apart from the eponyms, the Old Minoan text is indecipherable. But that does not mean we cannot catch the drift of the inscription, because we can. It certainly makes sense that Tanunikina, despite her best efforts to spin or weave a magic spell, cannot heal Ninuna. We can infer that Tanunikina is a healer priestess. Such personages were extremely common in the ancient world, and certainly in Minoan Crete and on the Mycenaean mainland, with this practice surviving into archaic and classical Greece. She may even be an oracle, such as we find at Delphi much later on in ancient Greek history. If she is an oracle, she probably worked from a Minoan peak sanctuary.

Linear A haiku: the saffron goddess, her crimson dress adorned with ivy:

In this haiku, all of the words except sarai = “flax” or “saffron” (the latter in this context) are Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1). The onomatopoeia of the 3 phrases rolls off the tongue. Not only is her dress adorned with ivy, apparently she is as well.

Linear A tablet ZA 15 VERSO (Zakros), so little text, so information rich, all about wine, with yet another Old Minoan word conclusively deciphered!

If there is any Linear A tablet which conveys so much information in so few words, this has to be it. No one could be blamed for thinking that a tablet, whether or not it is inscribed in Linear A or Linear B, which contains only 2 words (qedi & kuro), 3 ideograms (wine) and one supersyllabogram would have little to say. But this is far from the case here. This tablet offers us the best of 3 worlds. First of all, the word kuro is Mycenaean-derived New Minoan; secondly, we are finally able to establish once and for all and beyond doubt that the Old Minoan word qedi actually means a flagon for wine. Since it appears on other Linear A tablets in conjunction with the same ideogram, wine, the meaning is indisputable; and thirdly, the supersyllabogram RA, as all supersyllabograms are, is information-rich. It can stand for only 1 of two possible Linear A words, rani or ratise, which are, believe it or not, practically synonymous. First we have rani, which means “anything sprinkled (as in a libation); rain drop”, and then ratise, which appears to be instrumental plural for “with drops of wine”. So the inscription reads the same way either way. I would like to point out as well that no linguist specializing in Linear A, not even Prof. John G. Younger, has drawn explicit attention to the supersyllabogram RA, which is critical to a proper reading of this tablet, since no Linear A, let alone Linear B, researchers have recognized supersyllabograms for what they are, until I myself deciphered all 36 of them in Linear B between 2014 and 2016, the results of my research consequently published in Archaeology and Science, Vol. 11 (2015) ISSN 1452-7448, pp. 73-108:

And not to be outdone, I have also already isolated the 27 supersyllabograms found in Linear A. It actually came as no surprise to me that Linear A has supersyllabograms.

As it so turns out, it was the Minoan Linear A scribes who invented supersyllabograms, not the Minoan-Mycenaean Linear B scribes. You will note that I have already been able to decipher 10 of the 27 SSYLS in Linear A, including that for RA, which in the pottery and vessels sector signifies “with drops of wine for a libation”. The enormous and far-reaching implications of supersyllabograms in both Linear A and Linear B cannot be stressed enough.

Linear A fragment PH 7 (Phaistos) which is definitely a religious incantation:

Linear A fragment PH 7 (Phaistos), entirely inscribed in Mycenaean-derived New Minoan, is definitely a religious incantation. It is fascinating to note that the incantation is highly reminiscent of the Christian mass or communion, call it what you will. The priestess pours water, udiriki (instr. sing.), from a cup, dipaja (gen. sing.) and offers jatimane or the blessed bread of healing to her suppliants, while the whole ceremony, apparently conducted in a small shrine, is illumined by a firebrand. What a lovely, intimate picture of a scared religious ceremony this draws!

Inscription from Malia in New Minoan Linear A, Tainaron, a town with authority:

Here we have yet another inscription from Malia in New Minoan Linear A, which appears to invoke the supreme authority of Tainaron, a town at the southern tip of Laconia, with the blessings of the gods. If this tablet is indeed inscribed in Mycenaean-derived new Minoan, then it is the fourth of the tablets from Malia I have deciphered, all of them in New Minoan. It would thus appear that the Mycenaeans had assumed suzerainty over Malia before these tablets were inscribed, and that the scribes there were still using the Linear A syllabary to inscribe tablets in Mycenaean Greek, just before the switch-over to the new official syllabary, Linear B. It cannot simply be co-incidental that all of the inscriptions from Malia, including the famous IDAMATE labrys from the Archalochori Cave, appear to be inscribed in Mycenaean-derived New Minoan. In fact, the word Idamate can easily be rendered as “the mother (goddess) of Mount Ida”. It is also a matter of great interest to note that Tainaron itself is the toponym of Cape Tainaron,

where there was a sanctuary of Poseidon, who may very well be the god who has brought blessings on the town. It is to be noted that the Archalochori axe inscribed in proto-Greek is also in a sanctuary where a horde of bronze votive weapons, mostly axes, were discovered. Moreover, Malia tablet MA 1 appears to deal with Minos, the legendary king of Knossos offering gold to Rhea, mother of Zeus. In other words, all of the inscriptions from Malia deal with religious rites. This should come as no surprise, as more Linear A than Linear B tablets appear to focus on religious symbolism or rites.

Except for Tainaro, which is equivalent to the nominative neuter in Linear B, all proto-Greek spellings on this inscription have been adjusted to meet the exigencies of Old Minoan syntax. It would thus appear that etanasu is the Minoan orthography for hestanwn (standing, Greek Latinized), while pijani is the dative or instrumental singular in Minoan of the noun derived from the Greek verb, piainw, to enrich. The orthography of Tainaro appears to confirm that the nominative neuter in Linear B underwent no change in Minoan. This conclusion conforms with the table of 45 apparent Minoan masculine and neuter nominatives I recently posted:

Free translation of Linear A tablet KH 5 (Khania) concerning the shipping of wine by sea?

If this tablet, KH 5 (Khania) is inscribed in Mycenaean-derived New Minoan, then it would appear that it deals with the shipping of wine by sea. The fact that the floor boards are apparently level would imply that the shipment was carried out successfully in calm seas. On line 1, adakisika, which is Mycenaean-derived New Minoan with orthography adapted to Old Minoan, translates as “and adorned with ivy”, which implies that the cargo has been blessed by a priest(ess). If this is the case, there is text missing before this phrase, which after all ends with “and”, hence possibly “and adorned with ivy (blessed by a priest(ess))”. If NA references nauwi, i.e. “on a ship”, then the mention of “on a level wooden floor (i.e. deck)” makes sense in context. This decipherment may be largely correct, but there is no way of verifying this with any certainty. Finally, if PA is the first syllabogram of pa3ni (paini), which I interpret as Old Minoan for “amphora”, then the wine is being shipped in amphorae, the only way wine could have been shipped in Minoan times. As if…

Linear A seals: Part 2 + Minoan grammar, nominative singular masculine in u:Linear A seal HM 570.1g confirms beyond doubt that the word situ is New Minoan, i.e. Mycenaean-derived for “wheat”, a tight match with Mycenaean sito. But it establishes a lot more than just that. Since there are well over 200 Minoan words, whether Old Minoan or Mycenaean-derived New Minoan, all of which terminate in u, the circumstantial evidence is very strong that u is the nominative masculine singular of Minoan nouns and adjectives regardless. I have no idea what jetana means, as it is clearly Old Minoan.

Second of 6 Linear A fragments from Phaistos in New Minoan = matere = to Mother (Earth)?This second of 6 Linear A fragments from Phaistos appears to bear the inscription 2. = matere, which would be Mycenaean Greek dative for “to mother”, with right-truncated text possibly following being waiaia or gaiaia = genitive singular = “of Earth”, i.e. “to Mother Earth”. The inscription tagged 1. consists of what appears to be an unidentifiable right-truncated syllabogram on the left, followed by the 2 ideograms identified. It would thus appear that this fragment is at least partially inscribed in New Minoan, with the word “to mother” being derived from Mycenaean. There is a greater likelihood than might have otherwise been the case that this fragment is in New Minoan, since its provenance is Phaistos, where a large number of Linear B tablets, many of them quite detailed and lengthy, have been unearthed. So in view of this, it would appear that this fragment (of a larger tablet) was probably inscribed in the Linear A syllabary immediately prior to its abandonment and replacement by the new official syllabary, Linear B. Hence its date of composition would probably have been ca. 1450 BCE, and no earlier.

Minoan Costume History synopsis: a wonderful site!You simply have to check this site out! I have never seen such an in-depth study on Minoan costume, female and male alike, on the Internet. Here is just a small excerpt:An era of great development, contemporaneous with the civilization of ancient Egypt and Phoenicia, and which may be dated about 2000-1500 B.C., had preceded the civilization that came from Asia Minor into Crete and Greece. Such fragments of Cretan culture as have come down to us reveal a beauty of technique and a delicate sense of form to which no contemporaneous civilization provides any parallel. (italics mine). It is certainly true that the Minoans were far more style-conscious than people of any other contemporaneous civilization, such as the Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians and Hittites. No question about it.
Owing to the lack of written records, the processes and methods of manufacture are still wrapped in obscurity, but although we are thus reduced to surmise regarding the materials used, the dress of that time is of the highest interest in view of its connexion with the costumes of other peoples. Our attention is especially attracted by the dress worn by the women. The slim, wiry figures of the men are clothed almost universally with a loincloth, richly patterned and splendidly decorated. Here and there we see wide cloaks that clothe the whole body, giving it a large appearance. Women also, it would seem, wore the short loincloth, but we find them wearing in addition skirts put together in an almost fantastic manner that betrays a highly developed knowledge of the technique of dressmaking. These skirts are constructed in tiers, separated by strips of rich ornamentation. Illustrations from this site (there are many more, just as striking as these!)

3 alternatives in Minoan Linear A for pasiteoi = “to all the gods” in Mycenaean Greek:I rummaged through every last of the scores of Minoan Linear A tablets I have on file, searching for any rendition possible commensurate with the phrase pasiteoi = “to all the gods” in Mycenaean Greek. I have made the assumption, however misplaced, that since this a 5 syllabogram or syllable phrase in Mycenaean Linear B, the cross-correlated phrase in Minoan Linear A should run to approximately the same number of syllabograms or syllables, give or take. I found 3 alternatives. I had little choice, as there is simply no way or knowing whether or not any one of these 3, iqa*118, dadumata or *47nuraja corresponds to the Mycenaean phrase, if indeed any of them do. However, the chances are pretty good that one of them does.So take your pick. I lean towards dadumata, as it looks like it might be plural, though certainly not necessarily neuter plural, corresponding to the ultimate “a”, which imposes itself on any word in the neuter or feminine plural in Mycenaean Greek. One simply cannot transpose the last vowel “a” for the neuter plural in Linear B to Linear A. The same problem obtains with *47nuraja. On the other hand, transposition of “a” for Greek “ai” in Mycenaean Greek is a (somewhat remote) possibility in Minoan Linear A. But here again we cannot and must not leap to any premature conclusions. Each of these terms qualifies as the sixty-ninth (69) term I have deciphered, more or less accuracy, in Minoan Linear A.

What are the current prospects for deciphering Minoan Linear A? Dismal but...As historical research on Minoan Linear A has demonstrated over and over, every attempt by philologists and historical linguists specializing in Minoan Linear A and Mycenaean Linear B to decipher Linear A over the past 116 years has met with failure. Though some, like Sam Connolly, have claimed successThe Minoan language has remained a sealed mystery. Though I have brought all my intellectual resources to bear on the painful struggle to decipher Minoan Linear A, I too have made little headway. But that is not to say I have not made any at all. Still, the only words I have been able to decipher with any accuracy at all are those which are directly linked with ideograms. These ideograms happen to turn up almost exclusively on Linear A tablets dealing with vessels and wine, with little else to show in the other sectors of the Minoan economy. Moreover, I have found myself having to face the unsatisfactory prospect of having to “decipher” many Minoan words much less accurately than I would have hoped to. This usually happens because there is only one word to be found on only one tablet in Linear A containing that word in conjunction with an ideogram. One of these terms is qareto on Linear B tablet HT 132 (Haghia Triada), the only Minoan word prepended to the syllabogram for sheep. Now, in Mycenaean Linear B, there exist a number of single syllabograms preceding the ideograms for sheep, rams or ewes. Each of these syllabograms, which I have definitively defined as supersyllabograms (2014-2016), is the first syllabogram or first syllable of a Mycenaean Greek word. Two of these supersyllabograms (SSYLs) predominate in the sheep sub-sector of the agricultural sector of the Minoan/Mycenaean economy, outstripping all the others by a very considerable margin. These are the supersyllabograms O = onato = “lease field” and KI = kitimena = “a plot of land”. There are scores and scores of Linear B tablets directly dealing with sheep, which contain either of these two supersyllabograms.The problem is that there is only one word, qareto, on only one tablet in Minoan Linear A dealing with sheep, which does not leave us with much wiggle room at all. However, since the Mycenaean Greek words onato and kitimena appear with the ideograms for sheep, rams or ewes far more often than any other supersyllabogram, I have concluded that it is safe to assume that qareto in Minoan Linear A might be one or the other. But this state of affairs simply won’t do, since we can never know which one of the two it is, if indeed it is one of these two words for a specific type of field in Minoan Linear A. This confusion is compounded the fact that there are four other words naming specific types of fields in Mycenaean Linear B, arura or kama = unit of land (cf. metric, hectare), kekemina/no (adj.) = referring to common land and koto(i)na/no = plot of land, a synonym of kikimena. This brings the total number of specific terms relating to fields to six, making it impossible to accurately define qareto in Minoan Linear B. But it is not all that hopeless. If we cannot define qareto at the level of specificity allowed for in Mycenaean Linear B, we can still decipher it at the generic level of “field”, of which all 6 of the aforementioned are subsets. We are hedging our bets. While we suspect qareto is possibly some specific kind of field, we can safely say that it definitely is a field at the generic level, since all 6 types of fields found in Mycenaean Greek are subsumed under the notion of “field”. So qareto can be said to be pretty much synonymous with akoro. But that is as far as we can go. This is just one example of any number of Minoan Linear A words which allow for a more or less satisfactory decipherment, but which defy a truly accurate translation.I have compiled a list of terms in the agricultural, religious and vessels (pottery) sectors of the Mycenaean Linear A followed by another in Minoan Linear A. Both are as exhaustive as I could make them. I culled all of the Mycenaean Linear B words from Chris Tselentis’ comprehensive Linear B Lexicon, and all of the Minoan Linear A words from all of the relevant Linear A tablets on Prof. John G. Younger’s excellent site, Linear A Texts in phonetic transcription & Commentary (Click on the banner below to visit):
Of course, there is no way of knowing for sure that I have accounted for all possible terms relevant to the potential decipherment of Minoan Linear A. In addition, so many Minoan words on the Linear A tablets are either left- or right-truncated that I simply had to eliminate them, given that it is an exercise in futility to attempt to decipher these.The number of Linear B terms I have compiled amounts to a total of 64, while that of Linear A words to 62. This means that if we take all possible permutations into account, we end up with the figure of 3,968, or let us us say, 4,000 give or take. The implications of this figure are staggering. It means that if we are going to be able ever to decipher Minoan Linear A, we have to take into account at least 4,000 possible variations in determining the exact meaning of almost all of the Minoan words in the Linear A list.A hopeless endeavour? ... not quite. As I have pointed out above, the presence of ideograms directly associated with quite a few Minoan words makes the potentiality for deciphering those terms rather more promising. So where we have been able to decipher these terms more or less accurately, we can eliminate them from the list of Minoan Linear A words. But even so doing scarcely makes a dent in the number of permutations left in the remaining words, which is almost all of them. We are still left with the well nigh impossible task of aligning just slightly short of 64 Mycenaean Linear B terms with just slightly fewer than 62 Minoan words. The permutations still run to over 3,500. Given this depressing situation, the prospects for deciphering the remainder of the words in the Linear A list remain all but hopeless. The vast bulk of the Minoan language still remains a sealed tomb in a pyramid, from which I have managed to rob a few artifacts (i.e. the words I have managed to decipher, more or less).Here are the two lists, Mycenaean Linear B (all translated) first, Minoan Linear A second.The Mycenaean Linear B words I have successfully deciphered (more or less accurately) in Minoan Linear A are in bold in both lists. The Minoan Linear A words which I expect are susceptible to decipherment are in italics. After each of the Minoan Linear A words the total number of its occurrences on each of the Linear A tablets on which it appears is provided..Linear B olives & olive oil, wheat and barley, toponyms, vases & wine versus Linear A:Linear B: Grain/wheat/barley:akoro = fieldakotono = without plot of landapudosi = deliveryarura = unit of land (cf. metric, hectare)kama = unit of landkapo = fruitkekemina/no (adj.) = referring to common landkirita = barleykitimena = plot of landkoria2dana koriyadana = corianderkoto(i)na/no = plot of landkanako = saffron, crocuskuparo = cyperusmeno = monthmereuro = flouronato = lease fieldono (pl.) = payment, debtpasi/pasa (masc./fem.) = all rino = linen, flaxsasama = sesameserino = celerysito = wheat weto = this year/this year’s crop?zawete = this year(’s)Olive oil:erawa = olive treeerawo = essential (olive) oilkapo = fruitmeno = monthpasi/pasa (masc./fem.) = all weto = this year/this year’s crop?zawete = this year(’s)Religious:anemoiyerea = Priestess of the Windsdiwiyo =dedicated to Zeusdiuya/diwiya = priestess of Zeusdiuyayo = sanctuarydiwiyo = sanctuary dedicated to Zeusdosomo (pl.) = offeringsiyereu = priestiyeria (iyerea) = priestessiyero = sacredpasi/pasa (masc./fem.) = all pasiteoi = to all the godsqeteo = debt to the godssapaketeriya/yo = for ritual slaughterteo = god wanakatero temeno = palace shrineSheep:akoroToponyms:Aminiso = AmnisosKerasiyo/Kerasiya = CretanPaito = PhaistosVases:anowe/anowoto = without handles (vase, cup)aporewe = amphoraapudosi = deliverydipa = cupipono = (cooking) potkakiya/yo = made of copperkako = copperkarawere = stirrup jarkuruso = goldkurusupa3 = tripod amphoranewo = newpasi/pasa (masc./fem.) = all pia2ra/piyera3 = a kind of potqetorowe = with four handles (pot)rewotereyo = cauldronsoro = funereal urn (for ashes)tiripo = tripod = Linear A: pukoudoro = water flaskWine:apudosi = deliverykapo = fruitmeri = honeymita = mintnewo = newparayo = old, vintage/winewono = wineLinear A:Grain/wheat/barley:47nuraya (grain/wheat)adaro (grain/wheat) 40apu2nadu (grain/wheat) 5 + (olive oil) 3arudara (grain/wheat) 5ase + PA (grain/wheat)dadumata (grain/wheat)dame (grain/wheat) x 2 20 & 74dau49 (grain/wheat) + PA 20ika (grain/wheat) x 2kiritana (grain/wheat) 60kirita3 = kiritai +QE DI (grain/wheat)iqa118 (grain/wheat) kitai (grain/wheat)kunisu (grain/wheat) 20kupaya (grain/wheat) 16 + 40pa3ni = paini + PA (grain/wheat) 33pa3nina = painina + RE + SE (grain/wheat) 12pase + QE (grain/wheat) 20pitakase + TE (grain/wheat) 161pura2 = purai (grain/wheat) 5qaqaru + PA (grain/wheat) 5sara2 (alone)sara2 = sarai (grain/wheat) x 6 @ 10 1 20 20 26 41 976! 10 2 tereza?simita (grain/wheat) 5 sirumarita2 = sirumaritai (grain/wheat) 1 = Linear B: qeteo = debt to the godssise (grain/wheat) 16turunuseme (grain/wheat) 10 = Linear B: pasiteoiu34si (grain/wheat)watumare +KU (grain/wheat) 12+yaki + QE (grain/wheat) 5 (wine) 6 30zu22di + QE (grain/wheat) 40Olive Oil:datu (olive oil) 15itaya +DI (olive oil) 10kitai (olive oil) 1kupa3 = kupai + U (olive oil)kirita2 = kiritai + (olive oil) + QE + DI 10 & alonepi34te (olive oil) 5sara2 + DI (olive oil) tereza?saro (olive oil)saru (olive oil) 16 40sise + KI (olive oil) 1 + sise + MI (olive oil) 6 + sise + TU (olive tree) 3?teri + MI (olive oil) x 2 5 + widina + DI (olive oil) 3yedi + KI (olive oil) 1Sheep:qareto (sheep) = field (akoro,kama etc.) Toponyms:Dikate = Mount DikteIdaa = Mount IdaKireta2 (Kiretai)Kudoni = KydoniaMeza (=Linear B Masa)Paito = Phaistos (=Linear B)QekaRadu = Lato (=Linear B Rato)) Setoiya = Seteia (=Linear B) Sukirita = SybritaWinadu = Inatos (Linear B Winato)Vases:darida (vase) 2 (LARGE!) daropa (vase) = Linear B karaeriyou (gen.) stirrup jar?Wine:kura (wine) 5 (large amount) = Linear B: woinos?RA164aTI (wine) 38 (medium amount)sukiniyaki + QE (grain/wheat) 5 (wine) 6 (medium amount)of Linear B: woinosno. of permutations and combinations = 64 x 62 = 3968

Linear B tablet Pylos TA Ae 08 offerings of gold from her slaves to the priestess at Pylos:The Linear B tablet Pylos TA Ae 08 offerings of gold from her slaves to the priestess at Pylos is one of the most famous of all Linear B tablets. It rounds out our survey of 6 religious tablets in Mycenaean Linear B which may very well serve as templates for the decipherment of Minoan Linear A tablets in the same vein.

The co-dependent supersyllabograms KI = kitimena kotona & O = onaton in Linear B:The two supersyllabograms KI = kitimena kotona & O = onaton in Linear B are very frequently concatenated on Linear B tablets in the agricultural sector of the Minoan/Mycenaean economy. This combination of supersyllabograms KI + O occurs on scores of tablets from Knossos alone. These two supersyllabograms always precede the ideogram they modify, and this ideogram is always either the one for “rams” (most often) or “ewes” and occasionally for “sheep” (the generic ideogram). When linked together in this fashion they always mean “a usufruct lease field which is a plot of land”, in other words “a usufruct leased plot of land” within the context of a larger “lease field” of which this plot of land is one among several. How many we cannot say, because we were not there when the Minoan/Mycenaean overlords parcelled out their fields to be leased as smaller plots of land to their tenants.The number of leased plots per lease field may have been as few as 4 or as many as 10 or 20. If the number were to have run to the latter end of the spectrum, that would have meant that the lease fields themselves, which were to have been sub-parcelled into leased plots must have been quite large, even if the size of the separate leased plots might have been as small as approx. 1 hectare. In that scenario, a lease field with 20 leased plots of approx. 1 hectare would be about 20 hectares in size. It is to be clearly understood that we have no yardstick or should I say metric stick by which to determine exactly or even approximately the Minoans at Knossos or Phaistos or the Mycenaeans at Mycenae, Pylos and elsewhere actually measured the size of their fields. The hectare is just an approximation, nothing more. But it will do as well as any measure.On another count, we note that on this tablet, the land tenant is Siadyweis. He is not the land owner because he is clearly leasing a plot of land on a much larger lease field owned by the overseer. Also, we note that the person connected with the Minoan Goddess, Potnia, must be her priest, because it is in the masculine. This seems a rather odd arrangement to me, since in almost all other instances where this famous Minoan goddess is mentioned, it is with reference to her Priestess(es) and not her Priest(s). The Minoan religion was substantively matriarchal, not patriarchal. That said, this tablet clearly defines her attendant as her Priest.Several illustrations of the the Minoan goddess, Potnia:

Minoan Linear A, Linear B, Knossos & Mycenae

Linear B, Knossos & Mycenae, the premier blog on the Internet dedicated solely to comprehensive & intensive research into Minoan Linear A, Mycenaean Linear B & Arcado-Cypriot Linear C, as well as to The Catalogue of Ships in Book II of the Iliad.

Follow Blog via Email

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.